That's not what I meant...

When Columbus Board of Education President Carol Perkins said "the internal-audit division is
not going to be done away with," what she meant was "the internal-audit division is possibly going
to be done away with."

Perkins sent an email to The Dispatch today through the school district's spokesman to clarify
quotes that appeared in the paper this morning.

At Tuesday's school board meeting, board member Mike Wiles had offered an amendment opposing the
proposed state law that would create a new independent auditor for the school district, saying
"that would in my opinion basically eliminate the internal auditor's position and her entire
department, unless we were going to be redundant and have both of them."

Here is how Perkins responded: "Let me make one issue very, very clear, because I’ve heard this
on several occasions from the community: The internal-audit division is not going to be done away
with." She added that: "There would still be an internal-audit function, and this would continue to
report to the board, as well as the mayor."

The mayor's office told
The Dispatch Wednesday that it didn't want both positions.

On Thursday Perkins issued this statement: "During the discussion of the Columbus Education
Commission's recommendations at the May 21st Board of Education meeting, I did not mean to imply
that the District would retain an internal auditor if voters approve the creation of an external,
independent auditor as envisioned by the Commission's recommendations. To clarify, I simply
meant that the District would retain the service of an auditor. If HB 167 becomes law it will
be the District's voters who decide whether that auditor will remain an internal direct report to
the Board of Education or be replaced with a newly created independent auditor."

This isn't the first time the board has taken a stand only to quickly change its mind when Mayor
Michael B. Coleman disagreed. Earlier this year, the board said nothing could derail its plan to
hire a permanent superintendent to replace Gene Harris, though Coleman wanted an interim leader. It
caved and went with the mayor.